It's there a way to upgrade my Verizon Galaxy s4 from Spain ¿

[AC Question]

I have 4.4.2 SGS4.
I'm vacationing in Spain and when I turned on my phone when I arrived I had no phone or ability to connect to wifi.
The Verizon rep had me jump thru some hoops just to get the phone and basic text to work but said I can't use data, because my phone hasn't been upgraded recently, I was told.
They said I have to wait until I got back to the States.
It's there maybe a way to upgrade it I connect to a laptop?
Or some other workaround?
I'm on a cycling tour and using an app that I can't reload to navigate, so it's pretty important to me.
Any help would be much appreciated!!
Thanks

 

[the tall guy]

Hi, do you have access to WiFi? what happens when you go into settings, software update - do you have anything available. I don't see how a software update would prevent you from using data while abroad.